Appearance: Pours a dark chocolate brown with a tan cap that fades with rapidity but leaves plenty of foamy dots around the chalice

Smell: Creme brulee from a mile away; hard to imagine it is a beer

Taste: Vanilla, butterscotch and creme up front, with a building sweet intensity through mid-palate and beyond; unlike the draft version, the bottled sample seems all about the sweetness, right through the lingering finish

Mouthfeel: Full bodied with moderate carbonation; a bit cloying

Drinkability: Loved this on draft, but in the bottle, it becomes a bit tiresome; still quite an accomplishment to make a beer taste like dessert

Bottle: Poured a deep pitch-black color stout with a medium light brown foamy head with good retention and minimal lacing. Aroma is totally dominated by vanilla and some weird crème brulé-like syrup. Taste is also dominated by the vanilla and whatever syrup they've used and little else is discernable. Full body but could have been creamier with good carbonation and no discernable alcohol. Interesting experiment but a bit over the top and not sure I would want to drink a full bottle by myself.

Black, slightly dark brown on the pour. Tan foam and spotty lace. Huge vanilla aroma, pretty right on with the Creme Brulee name. Candy sweet. Not quite as perfect as Kuhnhenn's rendition in the aroma.

Sweet vanilla, brown sugar, maple syrup, with an undertone of chocolate. Earthy bitter hops surface towards the end, lending to the bittersweet chocolate flavor. Roasted malts in the middle too, buried under the sweet elements. Feel is lactic with a boozy kick to it.

This bottle was split 3 ways. If I had more than 8 oz. at a time, that might be pushing it, as far as drinkablity goes. Worth a try for sure, i'll be getting another one to make a float with.

Alright; I've heard just about all there is to hear about this beer. I'm walking into it open-minded; I think this is my first beer from Southern Tier. Expectations are high; I like the sound of it. Acquired at a local beer store for $15.00 (this shit's hard to come by in Los Angeles). 9.60% ABV confirmed. I don't have a snifter on-hand, so I'm serving the 650ml brown glass bottle with a standard pressure cap into a New Belgium stem-goblet in me gaff in Los Feliz. Reviewed live.

Served after a period of rest from the refrigerator and allowed to warm over the course of its consumption. Side-poured with standard vigor as no carbonation issues are anticipated.

A: Pours a 1.5 finger tan colour head of good cream and thickness, and great retention considering the high ABV. Body colour is a nontransparent opaque solid black. No yeast particles are visible. No bubble show. Pretty appealing for the style.

Sm: Sweet Jesus, that is one hell of an aroma. Overpowering creme brulee: custard, vanilla, sweet sugar, and luxurious dessert. Staggeringly appealing. I can't wait to try it. Buttery as all hell. I'm wary of the sweetness, but I'll bite. It's exactly as it should be considering the aims of the beer.

T: Heavy vanilla sweetness with custard and buttery qualities abound. Yes, that definitely tastes like creme brulee. And it's not as artificial as some have noted. Cream, custard, sugar, whipped cream, sinful vanilla dessert notes. Wow. Maltiness is hidden actually; I couldn't tell you if the malts were dark or light based on the taste alone. I assume they're dark. No roast at all. No real chocolate. Just creme brulee throughout, like a tasteful dessert wine. Definitely meets its aims, but the sweetness is quite over the top. I don't know if I want to finisht his whole bottle. No yeast or alcohol comes through.

Mf: Smooth, wet, creamy, clean, sinful. As buttery and sugary as they come. Suits the flavour profile near perfectly. Good thickness and carbonation.

Dr: Wow. This really does taste like creme brulee. It's right up there in the best specialty beers, for sure. The drinkability, however, is quite limited. Frankly, they bottled it in too large a bottle. No one in their right mind would want to consume the entirety of this bottle alone. I of course will do so because I'm not a pretentious twat who drainpours everything that isn't good enough for my posh lips. It hides its ABV remarkably well and would pair brilliantly with actual creme brulee, but the drinkability is very limited. This is one hell of a beer and it's certainly unique. I don't think anyone denies that. For that reason alone, every beer fanatic needs to try it at least once. Preferably in a small pour, though. This is a dentist's nightmare.

Pours black with a slight mocha head. The nose is really quite extreme--even for this series--as it brings forward loads of sweet cream and vanilla along with burnt sugar. In the back are some roasted malts, coffee, and light chocolate flavors. The taste really brings the sweetness forward and it gets to be quite cloying. The mouthfeel is rather thick and a bit of an alcohol burn sets in toward the end. I would really have a difficult time drinking more than 4oz. or so of this, though the nose is incredible.

A - Pours with one finger of medium brown head on top of an opaque, black body. The foam settles slowly and leaves light lace.

S - A sweet aroma of vanilla and coconut with a bready note that makes this beer smell like really good cake.

T - Sweet malt up front with notes of coffee, vanilla, toffee, and a hint of coconut. The toffee intensifies in the middle and more caramel character comes out to play with the vanilla. The beer finishes with a sweet note of caramel and rum with a little bit of spicy alcohol and herbal, turkish coffee.

D - If there was ever something that could truly be called a dessert beer, this is it. The vanilla is strong throughout, but it is especially vibrant in the aroma. There is a deep, rich caramel note to the flavor that really reminds me of flan. It is sweet and rich and weird and I doubt that I will find myself craving this particular beer again any time soon, but it is still a very well executed take on the idea of turning creme brulee into beer.

One of the few ST beers I havent had the chance to try,(it came out after I moved away from western NY)if you like creme brulee you will like this beer.Poured a jet black with a frothy one finger light mocha colored head,minimal lace was left as it settled rather quickly.Wow it cant get much more spot on in the aroma,burnt sugar and hefty vanilla/caramel aromas, with slight roast as well.Dessert in a bottle,the only problem is it gets cloyingly sweet in a hurry,big vanilla/caramel flavors with some mollasses as well,only a hint of dry roastiness comes through.My wife loves it and is finishing mine,I respect the job ST did in making this beer,its just to sweet for me.

Well, the first time I had this I thought it gave me diabetes it was so sweet. So I threw it in the cellar for a few years to teach it a lesson. Hopefully it learned that and it will be better. No date, but 3 or 4 years on it must have tamed this beast.

Pours a darker but not too dark colored fizzy head covering that fades pretty quickly, it tries to leave lacing but the alcohol shows it another thing or two, and it quickly disappears. The legs, however, are quite nice, and the beer is a dark essence of pitch black color, light keeps trying to get through but gets beaten down.

Nose, holy shit that's the essence of pure sugar! Like candied caramelized candy carmel... wow, candy kettle corn, brown sugar, molasses, plenty of creme brulee aromas, etc etc, oh and plain burnt sugar. It gets lots of cream aromas as well, milky cream and even a little eggy almost, but that could be my brain high on sugar vapors. Also lots of vanilla, lots and lots of vanilla like sugar marinated in vanilla and milk. Then some mild milk chocolate and cocoa aromas, and even a faint hint of espresso.

Taste, bgbggsshhsixjijsijsdofjodjfoajh, sorry sugar seizure! Wow sweet, candy up the... wait where does candy come from? Well there's just sugar everywhere, it's as sweet as I remember and maybe more. The 4 or so years in the cellar jail didn't tame this beast at all! Sugar, who doesn't love layers of sugar on layers of more sugar, brown sugar to start, molasses, candy, toffee, taffy even, caramlized sugar, candied caramel, and lots of creme brulee. Under all the sweet layers, and by layers I mean walls, comes a mild milk chocolate, more cream as well pretty creamy actually, no egg luckily, but again stacks of vanilla rolled in the sugar and cream and then burnt into cola syrup, and flan. Also hint of super sweet Brazillian style espresso. Finish is just ridiculous sweetness, sticky but not nearly as sticky as I thought, a bit more cream and vanilla, but tons more caramelized sugars, mild espresso dripped into pure caramel, and hint of warming booze.

Mouth is med to fuller bod, but like syrup, it even made my lips get that sticky feel like I just at a stack of pancakes covered in maple syrup, mild warming booze (only mild due to the huge eye popping syrupy sweetness), and decent carb.

Overall, well I am really mad at myself for cracking this by myself. If I somehow get through the whole bottle, I won't sleep for weeks, but at least I'll probably go for a 5 mile walk or clean the garage as I'll be so hyped on sugar. Hmmmm, maybe my Brazilian wife will like it since it's so sweet, let me see... her consensus, not too sweet (not surprisingly as she drinks ice wine and puts more than a 1/4 cup of sugar in one cup of coffee), just a bit too boozy and the espresso flavor is too much. Guess she won't be helping me finish it, I'm on my own. Too late to call in reinforcements, I guess I'll just cut it with lots of snacks and try to work my way through it.

22 ounce bottle into snifter, bottled on 1/9/2014. Pours dense pitch black color with a 2 finger fairly dense tan head with good retention, that reduces to a thin cap that lingers. Light spotty lacing clings on the glass. Aromas of huge caramel, toffee, vanilla, butterscotch, cream, custard, brown sugar, toast, light coffee, and light herbal hops. Fantastic aromas with very authentic creme brulee character with light-moderate hop presence; with big strength. Taste of big caramel, toffee, vanilla, butterscotch, custard, cream, brown sugar, toast, light coffee, and light herbal/pine hops. Slight earthy bitterness on the finish; with lingering notes of caramel, toffee, vanilla, cream, butterscotch, brown sugar, custard, toast, light coffee, and slight herbal/pine hops on the finish for a while. Incredible robustness and complexity of dark malt, lactose, and vanilla flavors; with just enough hop bitterness to cut out any cloying sweetness on the finish. Medium carbonation and full bodied; with a very creamy, slick, and slightly syrupy mouthfeel that is nice. Alcohol is very well hidden with only a light warming present after the finish. Overall this is an outstanding imperial milk stout! All around awesome balance of dark malt, vanilla, and lactose flavors with moderate hop balance; and extremely smooth to sip on for the big ABV. A highly enjoyable offering.

A - opaque, but clear, dark red-brown body with great reddish highlights under light. Smallish but durable tan head.

S - smells like a superb liqueur; vanilla and caramel dominate, but has good depth and complexity. I'd give it a 5 were it not for the alcohol, even though it is partially hidden.

T - like the smell, this is rather weet, but well-crafted with the flavors and aromas blending very nicely but in your mouth. Smooth, tiny bitter kick, liquid vanilla creme cake. Very sweet but I like it.

Wow, what an incredible beer! Of course I got robbed for it... $7 for 10 oz. glass at the Diamond in Brooklyn. I could have just bought a bottle, but in the end I guess it was worth it. Oh, and the bartender refused to give me a sample first, she said that would cost $2!!! But I digress. The 10 ounce glass was probably just the right serving, as it is sweet and any more would have been just a touch too much. It's really a dessert beer, although I enjoyed it right at the bar none the less. Massive amounts of vanilla, caramel, and sweetish, cocoa-accented malts are found in the nose. It actually kind of smells like cake! And that carries over into the flavor. Vanilla. Caramel. Cocoa. Sugar. Butter. Chocolate. And just an edge of roastiness underneath. It's sweet but it somehow manages to keep from becoming cloying, and that's at least due in part to the roasted malts. Remarkably smooth. Creamy. Utterly (pun intended) remarkable. That said, this is a very special beer, and would be perfect for special occassions. Valentines day. Christmas. And it makes an undeniable eye-opener for women who "don't like beer". Oh, and I wonder how this would be alongside Lindemann's Framboise - or even mixed together? I am definitely going to buy more of this!

I believe this may be the most outrageously flavored malt beverage I've ever tasted. I won't go so far as to say "beer." Actually, a malt liqueur is exactly what it is. Start with a shot glass or a tiny wine glass of it. Chocolate milk taste, only intensified and scorched, and blended with some kind of blackened malt brew. To say this tastes like vanilla is like saying gulping 151 rum is kind of hot.

It's not totally sweet, it's just that the flavor seems to channel the sugar receptor right to the brain. I suppose this might be good with some equally sweet dessert so you could pretend this is Drambuie. I guess the key to whether you would score this high or not is how much you like that totally sugary sensation, like Mexican candy or Greek preserved fruit. I give it an "N" for Novelty.

Dark brown in color average carbonation in the glass and in the mouth. Some sharp notes which we may thank the carbonation for. Bitter aftertaste adds to the confusion. From the 22 oz bottle bought at Bottleworks in Seattle.

On-tap 9/4/08 at Doherty's East Ave Irish Pub, in Pawtucket, RI, served in a snifter glass.

A: The beer is a deep black color, with a short off-white head that fades slowly and leaves a thick lace on the glass.

S: The aroma is of strong creamy chocolate and vanilla along with roasted malts.

T: The taste is very malty and sweet up front as you would expect from an "imperial milk stout" with strong milky flavors of chocolate and vanilla. There's a mild but complimentary hops presence that brings some balance. The after-taste is slightly sweet.

D: Tasty and flavorful, goes down dangerously easily, slightly filling, deceptively strong kick, very good representation of style, since this beer is so heavy, it's a good sipper to sit down and relax with and also works well as a desert beer.

Taste: Strong flavors of dark caramel, chocolate, roast, unbaked cookie dough, honey-soaked oven-toasted nuts, and fresh vanilla. Tons of sweetness throughout. Southern Tier, like the Indians, used every part of the vanilla bean. Creamy milk, fire-licked sugar crust. Touch of roasty bitterness, but, let's be honest, nowhere near the level needed to even begin to temper the dessert-like sweetness. All of the flavors race across the palate on the way to the coffee-ish finish.

Tarantula brownish black with blood red highlights. The beer is anything but a black hole and appears barely opaque when backlit with afternoon sunshine. Atop the liquid sits a golden brown sugar colored crown that gets the job done, including leaving attractive sheets of tattered lace on the upper reaches of the glass.

My nostrils don't have to get anywhere near the glass to appreciate the aroma. The beer smells like a flavored coffee drink that's dominated by caramel. I suppose it also smells like creme brulee, but I've only had that dessert once and that was more than 20 years ago. Do I smell coconut as well? Odd.

I can see how Creme Brulee is a polarizer. It's both different and delicious, but it's starting to wear out its welcome as the ounces cruise by. It doesn't seem possible that the brewers created this flavor profile with nothing more than dark caramel malt, vanilla beans and lactose. Then again, why not?

Creme Brulee is billed as an Imperial Milk Stout, but it doesn't really taste like it. That whole burnt sugar/creme caramel/vanilla vibe takes it in an entirely new direction. For my money, Southern Tier's Imperial chocolate stout (Choklat), Imperial coffee stout (Jahva) and Imperial oatmeal stout (Oat) are much, much better. Those first two are outstanding.

It's weird how I still taste coconut. That's in addition to the flavors described above, plus vanilla and melted milk chocolate. The Columbus and Horizon hops provide a background bitterness that keeps the beer from being overly sweet. In the end, it doesn't all come together as well as I'd like.

Considering the style and the ABV, the mouthfeel fails to close the deal. It's a fraction thin and isn't as creamy as it should be. The carbonation wouldn't be as noticeable in a plusher, more velvety brew.

The Black Water Series from Southern Tier contains some of the best beer on planet Earth. Unfortunately, Creme Brulee misses the mark (although not by much) because it pushes the envelope too far in one direction. Some love it, some hate it. I can take it or leave it.

On tap: major improvement from when I had it in a bottle. Again, poured a thick, chocolate brown with a nice tan head that retained for a little while, but almost disappeared mid-drink. Caramel and toffee in the nose, cream, and dark malts. Unlike the bottle, the taste matched the aroma more and was more enjoyable with almost no aftertaste. It tasted sweet and creamy, and well, like creme brulee, as the name would imply. Finishes dry and a bit bitter. Smooth, rich mouthfeel, and nicely drinkable.

Picked this one up in a trade recently. I had been dying to try it as I had heard some mixed things regarding it. Needless to say I just had to get it. Twenty two ounce bomber that was served at cellar temp and poured into an oversized wine glass.

One of the best pours I have seen in a long time. Rich dark brown, essentially opaque with a huge head of off white foam that reached a height of three inches before finally deciding to come down to around two inches and leave it at that. Huge amounts of side glass lacing just ringing the inside of the glass and thoroughly coating everything that was in sight.

The aroma was just insane. I am not even sure what to make of this one here. Rich and bitter vanilla flavor. A touch of light alcohol, but this was very well hidden. Huge aroma here, my wife complained later in the night she could smell it an hour after the bottle was empty. This was the thickest, most bitter vanilla smell you could imagine. The flavor was more of the same. Now I have heard mixed reviews about this and I can really see why. You have to take it for what it is. This is a dessert beer, this bottle should be shared with like four people as by itself, this is way too much for one person. I was really struggling towards the end, as the flavor was soo insanely sweet, maple sugar, vanilla, molasses, hints of caramel, I mean if it was a kind of sugar it was dumped in this in great quantity. There was a smooth, delicate feel on this with more then adequate carbonation making up the majority of the body. But still, even the aftertaste hung with you for what seemed like a day and a half. A sipper for sure, but something that needs to be shared.

Overall not bad at all, not the best thing, but for what the style is, this was actually pretty damn good. It looked and smelled fantastic, it was just the overall volume of this bottle was a bit much for me. Something akin to a KRE would be much better for this as it is needs to be sampled in limited amounts. A must try though for the novelty of it.

A: Pours an opaque jet black in color with some dark brown highlights and light amounts of visible carbonation. The beer has a half finger tall tan head that quickly reduces to a small patch of very thin film and a thin ring at the edges of the glass. Light to moderate amounts of lacing are observed.

S: Strong aromas of butterscotch, vanilla, and caramel.

T: Strong flavors of caramel, brown sugar, heavy cream/whipped cream, and vanilla. The overall flavor is quite sweet but not cloying and very tasty. Very much reminds me of the flavors of creme brulee.

M: Just a touch heavier than medium bodied with moderate amounts of carbonation. Silky smooth.

O: This beer is quite easy to drink with the fairly high ABV extremely well hidden. Super enjoyable, I think of this beer as dessert with the sweetness and it delivers on the name/description. I have enjoyed this one since the first time I tried it and many of my family have grown to enjoy it as well after having me suggest they try it.

Pours mahogany with a pinky of tan head. Above average head retention & average lacing

S: Rich caramel & coffee, & a touch of coconut; & a touch of cinnamon as this warms; yummy

T: Yummy caramel & a touch of coffee, some leafy hops hiding in the background up front. Coffee grounds do battle with chocolate & more caramel as this warms. Finishes much caramel & creamy chocolate notes. This is pulled off nicely

MF: Medium bodied, some stickyness, semi-creamy & low carbonation

Drinks pretty good, I could pound a few with dessert, a cheese tray or even a red curry. Will ding it a bit, because it would grown old after about 2 pints as a stand alone session beer. The ABV is artfully hidden

I do so enjoy beers that stay true to their names. This 'un pours a straight obsidian topped by a finger or so of light tan foam. The nose is a dessert in its own right, comprising buttercream frosting, vanilla, cane sugar, chocolate syrup, maple syrup, molasses, sweet toffee, powdered sugar, and a vague sense of french toast or funnel cake. You know, sweet breads and whatnot. If I could literally eat smells, this would near the top of my list in terms of desireability. Happily intrigued, a taste must be had. A lot of the sweeter notes are still there, but are subdued, allowing some light roasted malts to come through, ensuring a more well-rounded, if somewhat weaker, tasting experience. The body is a rather hefty medium, with a light moderate carbonation and a rich, velevety feel. Damn, I enjoy this brew. Even better, the smell tends to linger in my apartment, allowing me to enjoy its sweet, sweet smell for a few days hence. Good times.